Featured Articles

Most Common Majors of Billionaires

Apparently, the world's most influential billionaires have more in common than cash!

Elizabeth Hoyt

August 21, 2015

Who wants to be a billionaire? Well, most people probably. Money shouldn’t be the ultimate factor in your academic pursuits, however, if you’re dying to be a billlionaire, there’s a list that may make you rethink your chosen field.

According to Vista College, the world’s top billionaires had certain college majors in common.

According to the list, the following majors are the most popular held by the world’s billionaires, in undergraduate studies from around the globe.

If you’re debating on whether or not a college degree is worth it at all, please note that just over one percent of the world’s billionaires dropped out or did not attend college. So, the odds of making billions without a college degree are slim to none.

It’s important to note, however, that even if a billionaire has an engineering degree, for example, he or she has likely applied entrepreneurial and business skills to his or her career as well. Most of the wealthiest in the world would actually classify themselves as entrepreneurs, regardless of what their degree states.

In other words, take these with a grain of salt because a major doesn’t guarantee billionaire status.

Mathematics: 3 Billionaires

However, two of these billionaires took on double majors. Ballmer also studied economics at the same time while at Harvard and Brin took on computer science at the same time at the University of Maryland.

History/Art History: 3 Billionaires

Three of the world’s billionaires are history buffs and have the undergraduate major in common: David Thomson (Net worth $24.1 B), Abigail Johnson (Net worth $18 B) and Alejandro Santo Domingo Davila (Net worth $13.4 B).
Interestingly enough, all three of these undergraduates focused solely on history or art history (Abigail Johnson) as their sole undergraduate major.

Philosophy: 3 Billionaires

Murdoch studied more than philosophy, however. He took on three majors in total, also studying politics and economics at the University of Oxford.

Political Science/Politics: 3 Billionaires

Three of the world’s major money-makers, Ananda Krishnan (Net worth $11.8 B), Tadashi Yanai (Net worth $16.4 B) and Rupert Murdoch (Net worth $14.5 B) studied politically-related majors while undergraduates. It’s important to note, however, that both Yanai and Murdoch took on other majors as well.

Yanai studied both economics and politics while at Waseda University. Murdoch studied philosophy, politics and economics at the University of Oxford.

5. Law/International Law: 2 Billionaires

Two of the world’s billionaires, Alisher Usmanov (Net worth $19.5 B), and Charlene de Carvalho-Heineken (Net worth $11.6 B) chose to take on law majors while in undergraduate school.

Does this affect your choice of major? Why or why not?

Need Money to Pay for College?

Every semester, Fastweb helps thousands of students pay for school by matching them to scholarships, grants, and internships, for which they actually qualify. You'll find high value scholarships like VIP Voice's $5,000 Scholarship, and easy to enter scholarships like Niche $2,000 No Essay Scholarship, and internships with companies like Apple, Google, Dreamworks, and even NASA!